Surrounded by fools
by Emtec
Summary: Voldemort's been defeated. Harry is in a kind of comma. A slythering witch with her own views of the world: being alone is the only way to protect oneself from people's stupidity. There's much to be learnt from her, but much more that she has to learn...
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This is different from the rest of the fanfics i started writing but didn't finish, i've completely jumped Harry's 7th year to write from the point of view of Season Armonia, a Slythering living the 'post war' to make it more interesting and not risk any guesses about the 7th book (i don't care if Harry is meant to die, here he's not! And, who can deny that Voldemort's defeated in the end?). Please inform me of any grammar mistakes that you find, i am quite secure of my english but still it isn't my first language!

Well, other than that read and review!

Emtec.

* * *

_Surrounded by fools –or so she thought._

_1._

"You know, sometimes it's all right to cry."

"How would you know that?"

Great, one tries to be nice and is always reattributed with sarcasm. I would like to wipe sarcasm off this world… but then, what amusement would there be? He was just one little cry baby, who would snap at someone that is trying to actually make use of her maternal instincts for once in a great while?

However, I tried not to let my short temper get the better of me. I don't know if it was because of my will or not, there was just something appealing in the angry and teary eyes of the young boy that made me want to befriend him and console him… I knew he was a first year, not just because of his height or undeveloped physique or because of the soft features still adorning his face, but because I recognized him to be one of the last first years boys to be sorted into Slythering in the first day of school's banquet; he had been snickered at because the hat had taken longer than usual to decide over his house, but he had been sorted out at last. A week later after the start of classes I still remembered him; that was something for someone like me...

"I know because everyone tells you that, that's how" I said matter-of-factly deciding not to lie to him. I couldn't pretend like I was good at giving advise, I never was and never will be, but those pick up lines you just hear everywhere.

"Leave me alone" he said hiding his head between folded arms, the same way that a child that hasn't been given the gift he has asked for his birthday would –spoiled brat.

I knew exactly what the matter here was; I had seen it with my own eyes. He had been taunted by the first year boys because of his surname and about not being a pureblood. I had been surprised myself that a half-blood had been sorted into Slythering, but still I had found their taunting childish and unasked for. Whoever said children were the synonym of innocence? Children can be as cruel as adults –meaning between them, of course-, the damage made by one child to the other can be enormous, more than that of an adult to a small child, leaving aside any kind of perverted thing… I'm talking about psychologically.

I'm speaking like some kind of amateur psychologist, I know, but I've learned about these kind of things just by observing, that's all I do. By observing one can learn very interesting things…

So I had seen these kids been mean to this other kid and I had immediately told them to sod off, it's also interesting the power a seventh year can have over a first year…

So that's how I got to the present situation.

"I will if you cry".

Now he did look up, to glare furiously at me. His eyes were still filled with tears, but I could bet that the anger of having me bothering him made them more watery still, in a anger-watery-like-sort of way.

Almost everyone had retired to their bedroom, and I knew that in any moment I would be given the order to make sure that everyone was in their beds. No one was paying attention to us, so if he did decide to finally let the tears fall, no one would see him… I was surprised at myself for my own consideration.

"Are you going to start bothering too?" he said with anger, his voice becoming raspy at the end as if he had something in his throat… I knew better, though.

Surprisingly, I didn't answer to his rhetorical question with a sarcastic remark as I usually did with everyone else, I didn't _feel _like being sarcastic with him. Instead, I leaned in front of him so that my eyes would be at the same level of his, and stared into his teary and angry dark, dark, eyes with wonder. I felt an unusual rush of tenderness towards him, _very _unusual; the feeling felt really odd, and I wasn't comfortable with it.

"It's all right, you can cry, there's no one to mock you about it around" I said.

"Stop. doing. that. " he hissed stressing furiously in each word. He was on the verge of tears now, I could see it.

Ignoring him, I sat next to him in front of the common room's studying table. He furiously stood up and glared with all his might at me. I was not in the least bit affected, I expected him to do that, or more likely, _be_ like that. I found myself wondering when I had become so wise… I still had to test the results, though.

"Doing what?" I said, sounding confused.

"Using that _tone_ on me. I don't need your pity. I didn't need your help, so stop sounding so condescending about it" wow, condescending… that was one big word in an eleven year old mouth. But he was still in the verge… he hissed his words like a real snake out at me.

I placed my elbow on the table and hold my head cocked in my hand, resting its weight on it, like that I looked openly and wonderingly at him.

"Why didn't you talk to them like that?"

That did it. I realized in time when the table started to shake under the weight of my arm, I lifted it off immediately; I certainly wasn't expecting that reaction. The bank started to shake too under me and I quickly jumped off it before it went soaring upwards and crashing into the ceiling. The same way that it had gone up, it came crushing down, responding once again to the effects of gravity.

I jumped a meter backwards as it threatened to fall on my head, I was saved by a very significant inch from having my head cracked opened. I collapsed hardly on the marble floor.

I had closed my eyes tightly shut preventing myself to see the mess it all would be if it did fell on my head. I was gratefully relieved when I saw the bank with its legs facing upwards an inch away from me. I looked around and found the boy sitting in a corner of the common room. I stood up and run truly concerned at his side. He was looking down at his feet, and under the coat of dark brown hair falling into his face I could distinguish traces of wet tears on his cheeks.

"You okay?" I said peeking down at him, leaning in front of him. He nodded and for a moment didn't look up at me. Something white entered my nostrils and I sneezed, loudly, an 'Atchu!' not typically coming out from me. That made him look up at me, but I was now glaring and studying the white cracked paint of the ceiling. I then looked around again.

The common room wasn't all the same mess, only the sector in which we were. The silver and white decorations remained still imposing and unchanged, nothing ever seemed to affect the elegance and aristocracy and snobbishness of the room. "You did quite a mess" I said admiringly. Surprisingly he smiled sheepishly directing his smile nowhere in particular. I looked back at him and read the tiredness in his eyes, he had had to use some amount of magic to do the mess he had caused, and crying also tires people… I also heard that somewhere.

Just in that moment, one of the head prefects decided to come down through the girl's wing stairs.

"Armonia, you were supposed to be doing your prefect round dow- What the hell happened here?!" Pansy Parkinson demanded as she looked wide eyed to where we were standing. I dismissed the cause of her outburst as unimportant.

"Just had a little duel. _Reparo!" _I said flicking my wand around and fixing the ceiling and the cracks of white that covered Slythering's studying tables and bibliotheca, I also returned the bank to its original position. Pansy looked suspiciously at me and curiously back at 'the boy' –I didn't know his name yet- not satisfied with my answer.

"Who won?" she said eagerly. I had to fight back a smirk; what a typical Slythering, always asking for the uninteresting part of the matter. Did winning have to do with ambition? Really, what should matter to her should be how much we had managed to _hurt_ each other.

"It was a draw, if you must know" I said uninterested, without looking at her while brushing the dust that was still attached to my robes; I knew Pansy knew I was a good dueler, which would give the boy quite a positive impression in her eyes.

Indeed, her eyes shone brighter and brushed curiously through the boy's figure, she was far away enough to not be able to distinguish that he had been crying.

"I'll take him to the hospital wing and see if I can be attended myself" I said not even thinking about having myself nursed. Pansy nodded, her short black hair bounced with each nod. I walked up to the boy and instructed him to get up and follow me, he obeyed without objecting which I silently thanked; a complain from his mouth would have cost me more time in the presence of the pestering head prefect, a Slythering would never oblige another Slythering to go to the hospital wing against his will, I was grateful that he was still so young and ignorant.

"Don't let yourself get caught by Filch" was her last helpful warning as we went through the portrait hole. As if I would ever allow myself to be caught on purpose… after all, we Slytherings didn't possess the virtue of being sneaky for nothing.

We walked through the dark corridors in silence, I making him stop or hide behind one of the armors whenever I felt or heard someone approaching. I was really going towards the hospital wing. When we got there, he stared apprehensively at the uncannily white hospital wing's door as they glowed in the darkness. They looked eerie in the dark.

"Don't worry," I consoled him "what's scarier is inside".

I pushed the doors opened and he stepped inside right behind me. I was received by a stern looking Madam Pomfrey standing with her hands on her hips and looking accusingly at me.

"This are no hours for roaming through the halls, prefect or not" she said glaring down at the green and silver badge on my robes. I rolled my eyes, not caring to hide the rude gesture from her.

"He needs assisting, what was I supposed to do? Leave him in the hands of our incompetent head-prefect with a high fever?" she looked at me accusingly signaling the boy to come forward and feeling his forehead; she took her hand out immediately, as if it had burned.

"Dear, you are as hot as a dragon, what have you been doing?" she said pushing him unceremoniously behind one of the bed's curtains and urging him to change into a magically summoned pajama, not giving him time to answer.

"Accidental magic, actually" I chirped in, without hiding the fact that I was impressed. She too looked startled for a moment, but recovered quickly.

"So that was it" Madame Pomfrey said nodding in understanding. "What is your name?" she asked him once he had changed and come out from behind the curtains.

"Alexander Mud" he said, tiredness evident in his voice.

So that was his name… poor boy, no wonder he had been snickered at, I admit I would've laughed too if I had been in the mood…

"Alexander, you will be drinking all the content of this little bottle" Madame Pomfrey said handing him an almost diminutive potion bottle with a green substance that seemed to be made up of different herbs. "Gulp it in one breath; otherwise it won't have any effect. But first, go to bed".

Alexander did as he was told and without rejecting the invitation went straight to bed. Believing my duty done, I turned to head back to my common room.

"And where do you think you are going?" Madame Pomfrey said causing me to turn around to face her. I looked at her slightly confused.

"I am not at all sick, I came here just to bring him… so, I'll go back to my common room now" I said nervously, all cunningness gone; I didn't like being in any place that smelled like a hospital, and the _hospital_ wing just did.

"Oh no, you are certainly not. It's past curfew and no students are supposed to be roaming through the corridors at this hour, regardless of the reason. I suggest you make yourself comfortable next to Mr. Mud's bed" she said bossily closing the hospital doors decidedly shut with her wand. I knew better than to bicker with a nurse, so I made myself reluctantly comfortable in the bed next to Alexander's.

"Good night" Madame Pomfrey said closing behind her a door that I supposed led to her bedroom. With a flick of her wand, the hospital wing remained in complete darkness.

I couldn't bring myself to sleep immediately, as much as I wanted to. I am a born insomniac, I never remembered a time where I could be able to close my eyes and get to sleep rapidly. That only contributed to make of me a not at all morning person, sometimes not even a _day_ person.

Alexander shifted in the bed next to mine. I turned my head to face him; he hadn't drawn his curtains shut and I could feel him staring at me in the dark.

"Go to sleep" I said gently. What was it about this kid that made me be so soft? I was not a gentle person; I wasn't used to responding to my feelings and instincts.

Maybe he reminded me of someone… I couldn't place my finger in who was it that he reminded me of, but I could tell he was different from the other Slytherings… maybe it was because I felt different from the rest too...

"You knew that would happen, didn't you? You did it on purpose" he surprised me by stating; his voice didn't sound angry, just curious.

I didn't answer, just looked at him in wonder in the dark. What was his point? On purpose or not it had worked out and now thanks to it he was laying in the hospital wing with a high temperature. Of course it hadn't been in my plans that his reaction would be so powerful to the point of sending things flying around, I had just expected him to blow up something, maybe a window…

"Why did you do it?" he said asked, openly curious now.

I looked up trying to distinguish the hospital's ceiling in the dark.

"You needed it" I simply stated.

He remained in silence, deep in thought, it seemed to me.

"I guess you are right" he said, after some time. That made me smile. "What is your name?"

"Season Armonia" I said straightforwardly, strange of me, I never introduced my first name to anyone; I did though for some reason to him. I didn't waste time asking myself why, by now I was too sleepy to care.

"I'm Alexander" he said without having me ask him, "but you can call me Alex".


	2. Chapter 2

_Surrounded by fools –or so she thought_

_2._

In the mornings my only regret is not being able to get back to sleep; once my mind has awakened there is no way to put it back to sleep.

I'm a light sleeper, besides of being an insomniac, both a blessing and a curse; if anyone was threatening to kill me in my sleep, I'd hear them, but my curse is to live without the restoring power of sleep; some days I'm so tired that I would choose risking murderer in exchange of some long, long sleep. I believe my irritability comes from lack of sleep…

So when I woke up the next morning in the hospital wing as soon as I felt people moving around me, I felt the exhaustion of having slept little or nothing; the only evidence that I had indeed slept was the fact that I had actually had to open my eyes. Someone had drawn the curtains around me; I could hear voices around me too.

"Has he woken up yet?" a hopeful voice asked, the voice of a girl.

"No dear, I'm afraid that his condition has not changed. We don't know yet if that's for good or bad" Madame Pomfrey said sighing at the end.

"If there is any change, will you remember to sent look for us please?" a male voice said, I recognized that voice, which led me to realize who the girl was. There was no answer to his petition, but I visualized Madam Pomfrey nodding understandingly. I quietly started changing back into my robes and waited for them to leave before I came out from behind my curtains.

When I finally went out, it was in time to see the forms of Weaslet and his mudblood-know-it-all-girlfriend retiring from the hospital wing. I glanced at one of the ends of the hospital wing where the curtains of a bed remained carefully drawn shut.

"What happened to him?" Alex's voice surprised me by suddenly asking. He was sitting up on his bed eating from a bar of chocolate. He looked healthy again.

I approached his bed and felt his forehead; his temperature had decreased noticeably. He repeated his question.

"Nothing, just finished with the Dark Lord and got drained from almost all his energy" I said as if it didn't mean anything to me.

Alex's dark eyes looked immediately interested, he glanced back at the curtains, as if they hid some undiscovered mystery…

"Harry Potter? I read about what he did… He must have been really powerful… too bad that he can't enjoy his triumph over _his_ defeat…" I didn't like the way in which he was talking. What could he know about all it? His comment caused me to snap at him.

"I don't believe he'd have something to enjoy if he woke up, the Dark Lord got away with many things before he was destroyed" I said coldly. Alex seemed to ponder over my words; I was surprised over the fact that my coldness hadn't affected him.

"He had his revenge" he finally said looking seriously up at me. I raised an eyebrow. How… little insight, but he was just a kid after all.

"If you believe that death is the worst that can happen to a person… " tell that to all the people that suffered because of him, hundreds of lives can't be revenged by ending with one.

"What curse is worse: the Avada Kedavara or the Crucio?" he asked unexpectedly.

Smart kid. He had understood what I had tried to tell him.

"The cruciates curse; it makes the person suffer" I said without hesitating. He slowly nodded looking thoughtful but in understanding. "But the crucius is not always needed to cause the greatest pain and suffering" I found myself needing to explain, "there are many forms of cruelty".

I was getting deep, I knew, but there was a point to which I wanted to get.

"Yesterday you were suffering" I said finally getting to the point I had wanted to make. He looked down at his chocolate and evaded my eyes.

"I don't want to talk about it".

"You'll live" I said straightening up, he looked curiously at me. "You just have to gain their respect and they'll stop bothering you"… was I giving advice? Wow, this was new. I had never imagined that I would be giving advice to a first year to help him not be bullied by his classmates; there had been plenty of bullied first years in Slythering, and I had never cared to do anything about it. The strangest of it all was that my advice – the advice of an amateur adviser- sounded quite wise.

I was suddenly alarmed. What time was it? I knew I had probably missed the first half an hour of my potions class; I couldn't afford missing any time further.

"Shouldn't you be in classes right now?" Madame Pomfrey reminded me with a frown looking disapprovingly at me. I nodded and started heading for the door.

"Bye" I heard Alex say from his bed. I turned to look at him and saw him smiling at me; I couldn't help but smile back at him. After that I left the hospital wing in a hurry not wanting to give Slughorn an excuse to take points off of his favorite house.

It felt weird to smile, i rarely ever smiled; Alex was turning out to be something and I didn't even know why.

"You didn't come back yesterday to the common room, I thought that perhaps you had been caught" Pansy Parkinson said latter that day as I entered the room where the Prefect's meeting was been held. Everyone was already there, I was uncharacteristically late.

I fought the urge to roll my eyes. What a nosy girl. Really, she had stayed up waiting for me to return? That was hardly believable; god knows what she had stayed up doing… I certainly wasn't interested in knowing.

"I'm sorry for my lateness, I was held up by Lupin" I lied, I actually had gone to check on Alex and found out he had already been released from the hospital wing. I took a seat next to a smirking Blaise Zavini, I noticed Pansy's eyes remained on me waiting for an answer. "I was not caught, Madame Pomfrey made me stay" I explained patiently.

"Oh… you were injured from your duel with the first year?" she said widening her eyes faking an inexistent innocence. She was trying to ridicule me in front of the other prefects.

"You dueled with a first year and got hurt?" Katrina Brown, a sixth year airhead said sounding appalled. She had a high pitched voice that made me want to cringe whenever I heard it.

"I was _not_ hurt, the nurse made me stay because she didn't want me walking back to the common room past curfew" I explained coldly, I had my pride.

Zavini kept on smirking at me smugly.

"Armonia, what the hell were you doing dueling with a first year?" he said sounding amused.

"Why the hell do you care?" I didn't even glance at him and sat up straighter on my seat looking expectantly at Pansy waiting for the meeting to begin. We were eight prefects -different from the usual six from each house of every year-, only the prefects of my house were called in for this meeting, and being Parkinson the head prefect of Slythering it was her duty to inform us about what was going on or what was being asked to do from us.

"Well," Pansy said finally starting "first of all let me tell you that this meeting was Mudblood Granger's idea" she paused, Zavini and the two other Slythering boys snorted. She smirked. "This meeting is simply to inform to the new prefects of their new responsibilities which of course they already know, and to decide over who is going to make the rounds at night each day".

Way of wasting my time… that was it? I didn't know why I had even cared about arriving on time, and to waste breath in an _excuse. _I had known from the beginning of the year that having Granger as a head girl would mean double unnecessary work me; it hadn't even passed a week since the beginning of the year and we already had a useless prefect meeting! I was grateful though that this time the meeting was not with all the prefects of the other houses and the head boy and girl, the one that we had had in the train had been boring and long enough. I didn't even know why I insisted in staying a prefect, I mean, not that I had decided to be chosen, but that I had actually never thought of declining the post, and in my case –particular from the rest of the Slytherings- because of the responsibility. It gave me something to do, I guess; prefect duties had never clashed with my schedule… And of course, it gave me a sense of importance too.

The rest of the time was wasted in deciding the schedules each prefect would have to suck up to, as always there were various arguments and bickering between the prefects because our dear head prefect had taken the liberty of assigning herself a schedule for each prefect. That, of course, wouldn't do.

"I'm not going to be making rounds a Friday night, I have a boyfriend!" Kirsten Brown cried frowning and managing to look like a wrinkled old hag.

Parkinson gasped in irritation.

"I don't care about your boyfriend, Kirsten, I don't care If you believe me or not but I sorted out the schedules fairly and they are staying that way!" she said. I snorted; she glared at me.

"Have you anything to say, Armonia?" she said narrowing her eyes at me. I rolled mine right on her face and stood up from my chair.

"I'll be sharp with my rounds, that won't give any unnecessary excuse to see you out of my scheduled time" I said, and with that left, leaving a furious looking Parkinson behind. I left the room holding my head back with the superior snobbishness characteristic of the house, I knew Parkinson of all people hated it when I did that; the only people worthy of feeling superior from the rest were her, Zavini, and Draco Malfoy… in her eyes.

I don't get along that well with the people in my house, it's not just prejudice from my part, it's just the fact that I hate all the fakeness and convenience and cunningness characteristic of the members of my house; friends are talked off at their backs, and there's always this rivalry between the members about everything; achieves, power, riches, blood… Alex's case is not the first one seen inside the walls of Slythering's common room, there have been others and of all kinds… It's like no one can be authentic, everyone is forced to wear a mask…even me.

I don't mean to say that there are no good persons in Slythering, there are, but it's difficult for the _good_ ones not to be corrupted by the rest. It's complicated to explain... the ones that are usually nice and good with their friends inside the house aren't nice with the students of other houses. Sometimes they just do it to fit in; in that case who can blame anyone from thinking that all Slytherings are the same? Not that I care, though.

With my classmates I'm cold, sarcastic and blunt –when it comes to ridicule someone that annoys me or that I dislike I am no better that any of them. I have no real friends; I can get along with someone for a while, but who knows if latter on that person becomes unbearable for some unexplainable reason and I feel suddenly unattached? I've never thought of myself as someone sensible or considerate… but then something like Alex's happens and I'm completely confused about how I am, how I really am. I am aware of the mask that I wear…but it just comes so naturally! And at least I'm not stabbing anyone in the back or lying and boasting about things the other might envy, it may sound strange, but I'm better than that. I may be a Slythering but I have my priorities –at least some.

I stepped inside the common room without having to force the straight and serious face I always wore. I had been lost in thought, so when I stepped without really looking where I was going, I received a painful crush of someone's shoulders colliding hardly with mine.

"Ow" I complained taking a hand to my shoulder and looking around to see the person that had so unceremoniously crushed into me. He of course, kept on walking through the portrait hole without even acknowledging me; _that_ made me mad; it had hurt and I certainly wasn't in the mood to accept anyone's rudeness. "You could at least apology for bumping into me, Malfoy" I said turning ready for a verbal fight with everyone's favorite sly.

"Sorry" he said and stepped out of the portrait hole. I stood skeptic on my place and with a raised eyebrow; had the slythering ice king just said the word 'sorry' to me and sounded casual about it? I was not the only one surprised, all around the heads had turned to look at me and gone immediately back to their business quickly losing interest in the matter.

I eventually shrugged the matter off and looked around the common room for any signs of Alex: no where to be seen. I sighed. I finally guessed retiring to my bed room for some studying should be best, I knew tomorrow I would be having a tuff Defense against the Dark Arts class, and I wanted to be prepared.

I grimaced at the thought of having DADA with the Gryffindors; I knew I had to prepare myself for a battle fight. I sighed again; as if we hadn't had enough yet.


	3. Chapter 3

Surrounded by fools

3.

Everyone is sick and tired of fighting and crying and losing their loved ones after a war. During the war, everyone desires peace, and during peace times everyone is waiting for something new to show up; it disgusts me. Do they know what they are doing, this people that insist on having Gryffindors and Slytherings in the same class, duel? I am not joking; I am being dead serious about this, look at them! Look at us, everyone's glaring and smirking and snorting and mocking everyone any time that they like. This is not right.

"Are you going to fire any time soon?"

And I hate Gryffindors.

"_Kretkekakek!" _

It hit him, square in the chest. He went twirling to the other side of the room smacking his head hardly against the wall. Of course, he also screamed like a baby all the way. I smirked, a small malice smile.

"Pathetic" I said blowing off the tip of my wand as I knew they did in the muggle movies. All around the Slytherings were laughing heartily, as if it had really been a good joke. Everyone had gathered around probably mistaking our little practice duel with a show.

"Well done, Miss Armonia" Professor Lupin said annoyingly pleasantly as usual, "The rest of you, return to your duels and fire only when I say to".

Everyone went grumbling back to their places and faced their opponents. Simon Chains, whom I had previously cursed, came back to face me glaring with the fury of the hurt pride; how very typically Gryffindor-ish.

"This time it won't be me getting hurt" he said menacingly. I merely glanced at him.

"Did you really get hurt? Sorry for that, but I thought the idea was for you to block the spell, not get hit" he glared daggers at me once again and I shrugged it off. I didn't care about the feelings of that idiot boy, he had caused himself the pain by taunting me to attack him, should've seen it coming.

"Prepare" we all raised our wands "face your opponent" both Simon and I looked at each other in the face, "and…"

"_Sectusempra!" _

Fuck.

I felt a stinging pain in my chest, as if I had been slashed. I was hit backwards landing harshly on the cold marble floor. Hot blood started staining my robes and I grimaced from the pain. All I could see was red.

"Everyone step back! Step back!"

It hurt…a lot. I had never experienced pain in a physical manner before, and it felt excruciating. I hated it. I felt my eyes rolling in their orbs and I could see nothing but undistinguishable forms above me.

"Stay with us, Season, don't slip away!"

Someone was carrying me… the same someone that had used my name… how dare him…?

"Madame Pomfrey, quick!"

* * *

I woke up gasping from the pain in my chest. I had passed out at some point after been wounded and I couldn't remember anything since then. I tried to sit up on bed, but that only caused more pain.

It is difficult for me to wake up and not remember what has happened previously, just before I lost consciousness to sleep. I usually wake up with a vivid image of something I was doing or should do, as if I had a time planner in my head altogether with an alarm clock. Because of this, when I woke up in the infirmary I was all too aware about the fact that the stupid Gryffindor had cheated and fired at me a spell that was likewise to be a dark one.

"Dammit" I muttered taking a hand to my chest. My hand immediately felt awkwardly humid…

Oh-no, was it…?!

"Blood! Ew!" I started scrubbing my hand desperately against the bed sheets. If there was something that disgusted me more in this world, it was blood, knowing that it came from inside of a person's body… I grimaced.

I tried to resist the urge of looking down at the bandage that covered the wound; I couldn't. I looked down and found out that what was supposed to be a neat white bandage was a slimy red and smelly… _thing_ sticking to my body.

"Oh, dear, it hasn't healed yet!" Madame Pomfrey said rushing to my side.

"Looks like it hasn't… wait, you should know about this! Why doesn't it stop bleeding? Haven't you used some kind of potion to stop the bleeding?!"

Madame Pomfrey didn't answer me and started undoing the stinking bandage; still, I didn't miss the worried frown that appeared in her face. I was awfully concerned then, for my own health of course and I am not ashamed to say it; had she used a potion on me already and it hadn't worked?

"Agh! It stings, be careful!" I snapped unable to control my temper with the pain of the bleeding gash. She ignored my comment with professional coolness; either she knew not to pay attention to the remarks of cry baby students or she knew how much it hurt. She was being really careful with the bandage, and careful always takes longer.

I was beginning to feel the effects of the loss of so much blood, my energy was slowly starting to drain and I didn't like the feeling.

"Just rip it off, it's okay" I tried to snap but it came out sounding more like a pleading. I was afraid; my eyelids were starting to feel unusually heavy…

I don't know how, and I don't know exactly when… but in somewhere between the taking off of the bandage and Madam Pomfrey giving me some funny tasting medicine to gulp down, I fell asleep.

* * *

Surprisingly… not, I woke up a week later to a bright and illuminated Hospital Wing. I felt very weak, but I felt no pain; I should have been thankful for that, but when I woke up I was in no mood to be grateful to Madame Pomfrey, I was in rage to see that something was done to the loser Gryffindor that had cursed me so.

"Armonia, something will be done, leave that in the hands of Proffesor Lupin and the headmistress" Madame Pomfrey said to me when I expressed my fury. She looked quite concerned with the subject, but her preoccupation was diminished over the fact that I had 'healed' so quickly; two years ago Harry Potter had slashed Draco Malfoy with the same spell, knowing Potter, it was evident that he hadn't know what the hell the spell was about and Malfoy had been in quite a state for a long while… It was very stupid of him to use a spell that he didn't know what it did, but no one said anything about it, although the spell had been proved dangerous Potter hadn't been expelled.

Now, Chains knew exactly what the spell did… it was going to get him expelled. I was determinate that he was.

Other than planning Chains expulsion, I found myself a new entertainment or rather he found me, though I wasn't able to completely figure out if I liked it or not.

"I'm glad to see that you are awake" I was surprised the first time that I saw the young boy with his brown hair and with the interesting black eyes. There were no tears threatening to come down, Alex was beaming at me.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, badly surprised; did it only take to be nice to someone once in your life to have them suddenly attached to you –or worse, having him visit you in the hospital wing as if you were… friends? I was not a bad person to others, I was not _nice_, and if I had ever stood up for someone it had been unmistakably clear that I was trying to humiliate the other one. Alex seemed like a nice kid but…

"I heard about what happened and after pondering for a long time decided to come and see how you were" the way he spoke, sounding like it was the logical and simplest thing to do somehow freed me of the uneasiness that his visit had caused me.

"I've been sleeping for a week" I said, and his sudden shy smile and his nod made me smirk. "What have you been hearing of me from my dearest classmates?" Every time that something between a Slythering and a Gryffindor happened the rumors managed to get everywhere, getting bigger and bigger and a lot more exaggerated.

There wouldn't be much to exaggerate this time though, I pondered; it was not expected for a Gryffindor to use a dark spell against a Slythering, it would be more likely if it were the other way round.

"Not much… one of my classmates told me. And there has been a lot of quarreling between our housemates and the Gryffindors, the head girl and boy have had to intervene with the help of professor Lupin" all this sounded stupid, _was_ stupid. My housemates were using mine and Chains episode to taunt the Gryffindors. What a waist of time…

"Idiots" I said out loud shaking my head. Alex smiled.

"Why do our housemates hate Gryffindors so much?" Good question… but I didn't happen to have a good answer for that. I shrugged.

"I don't know… I think it is some kind of immature thing that has always existed. Maybe there was a real reason why Slytherings and Gryffindor didn't get along, but with the passing of time that reason was forgotten" I had asked the same question when I had started school; of course no one had bothered to answer, it was just like that, they said. Alex nodded and remained in a thoughtful silence.

I suddenly felt my cheeks heat up.

What was I doing exposing my thoughts to someone so directly? Alex might have been just a first year, but I had never had a conversation with no one in the school before, at least not a conversation in which I had the option not to join; okay, I face it; I was embarrassed at hearing my thoughts out loud. Alex might be someone insignificant, but still he shouldn't be hearing those things from me.

"You mean I shouldn't hate Gryffindors?" Alex's question was so unexpected that I blinked a couple of times; he was asking me if he shouldn't…? I started to laugh; at first it was a strangled giggle, but as I kept thinking of the naïveté of his question I couldn't help but laugh loudly and heartily. Poor Alex… he would surely find my laughter offensive.

But then something surprising happened… Alex started laughing too. I looked at him and admired how his face seemed to brighten up when he laughed. It was then that I realized what a cute boy Alex was.

"You can hate Gryffindors if you like," I said, my voice still laughing "just be sure to decide what'll be the reason for it. And why are you laughing?" I smiled, I was curious.

"You have a contagious laugh, and I realized how you were unlikely to ever tell me not to hate Gryffindor seen as you've just been badly hurt by one" I chuckled; he was right. And as for the contagious laugh…

"I don't have a contagious laugh."

"You do" Alex said, amused. How was my laughter contagious? It was just 'ha-ha-ha'. Ag, since when did I care about such trivial things such as if my laughter is contagious? I don't laugh often, why would I care?

"Armonia, there's someone here that wants to see you" Madame Pomfrey said. I looked up from bed to find professor Lupin standing next to Chains.


End file.
